[MUD-Dev] Birthday Cake (or Why Large Scale Sometimes Sucks) (long)

[Raph Koster]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: mud-dev-admin at kanga.nu [mailto:mud-dev-admin at kanga.nu]On Behalf Of
> J C Lawrence
> Sent: Tuesday, June 06, 2000 2:32 PM
> To: mud-dev at kanga.nu
> Subject: Re: [MUD-Dev] Birthday Cake (or Why Large Scale Sometimes
> Sucks) (long)
>
> Societies are built on agreements.  The members of the society agree
> to certain tenets which define that society.
>
> Many of us have some appreciation for cultures other than our own.
> We haven't reached that point for VR.
>
> the basic, simple, endlessly offensive meme of
> "VR is actually made of real people" is going to have to spread to
> the point where it becomes an instantly assumable.
>
> Further, realise that at some point, CitiBank or some equivalent,
> are going to base their electronic interface on the work we've done
> in our game worlds.

> How's *them* apples?

Familiar. You sound like you are channeling me. :) Only saying it better.

The CitiBank point is why I posted the Rights and also favor player
policing. And despite the simplistic view many have of player policing, what
I really mean by that is the ability for many kinds of people of different
stripes (including those unwashes masses of which you speak) to jostle
together in the virtual world and get along to some extent together, on
their own. Subcommunity formation. Cooperation, etc. It does NOT boil down
to controlling PvPers. It boils down to getting disparate worldviews to get
along in one space.

The basic meme you speak of is something I've been reiterating (and prefaced
the Rights with) for years now. Cf Story About a Tree. Look how many of us
here don't believe it! Or have trouble accepting its full implications,
perhaps because we'd prefer to not have the responsibility.

The fact that we need all sorts of people in a VR space, and that we have to
resolve the issues of subcommunities jostling against each other, is
something I view as a primary goal for the genre. It's why I disagree that
the future is in niches. Niches will exist, but niches we can make. We're
really arguing about the size of niche. Someday this won't be niche and if
we don't solve it someone else will. Personally, I wanna be along for the
ride.

I know many consider me a nutty idealistic weirdo for it, but... I believe
we do have a social responsibility. We're engaged in building what is
perhaps the greatest teaching--nay, IMPRINTING tool ever designed. I think
we should use it wisely. I think to think of it as just a game is braindead
shortsightedness. Even if we treat it as just a game, we're talking about
something that builds neural pathways while interacting with real people
with hyperaccelerated feedback. Yikes. This is dynamite we're messing with
here.

-Raph




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